Corporate Junk #16

We have an outstanding payment of $12k which we've billed last July. That was eight months ago. My accounts staff has been chasing for months. Month after month, the client's accounts department told us that our invoice had been submitted for approval. Their payment approval is done at the end of every month and only once every month.

For 3 cycles, our invoice has been rejected. This really frustrated me. My staff called their accounts to find out the reason for rejection and she directed us to the purchasing department who bought our products. We called the purchasing staff who had made the order from us. She told us she has checked with her superior and claim that the fault lies with the accounts department. For the sales side, she claimed that they have already approved the payment.

Frustrated, we called the accounts department and she told us to send them the invoice again and she'll try to obtain approval. From the address she gave to us, we noticed that it was a different operating address from the client and deduced that the client outsourced their accounts to an accounting firm.

A few days later, I called the accounts company and talked to the lady who was responsible for the payment of invoices. I chatted with her and asked her if she was from a different company as our client. She confirmed my suspicion and she has no authorithy in regards to the approval of payements. I continued to asked if there were other companies facing similar problems like ours. She hesitated but told me we were not the only company having the same difficulty. I actually began to sympathise her. I asked her wouldn't she be in the receiving end from the various companies who are chasing payments. She admitted that she gets scolded and shouted at many times and she said we were the only company who had not scolded her and had been patient and nice to her. I wondered if the client would delay payments to the "Big" companies. In fact, the client don't delay and payments are made promptly to the "Big" companies, she shared with me. This really made me boil.

I asked her if there is any thing we can do to ensure the collection of payments. She whispered and told me in a soft tone (as she didn't want her boss to overhear the conversation) that all we need to do is get a lawyer to send them a letter of demand and payment will be made promptly. She told me she shared this information with us because we have been nice to her.

I thank her and wished her luck (she has a tough job) before putting down the phone. Thank goodness we have been nice and we are able to obtain a "tip" on how to get our payment.

Why are there companies like these? Didn't we all start small? Why bully the companies that are perceived to be smaller in size? Why make us incur unnecessary expenses for engaging a lawyer to send a letter?

The legal letter of demand has been made. We shall see if payment will be made.

My First Encounter With ERP As A Driver

A few months ago, that same evening after I received the keys of my second hand Toyota, I needed to drive to town for an appointment.

Being a "new" driver and not familiar with driving the "new" car, I knew I forgot something but I can't remember what it was. I was also too busy making sure I don't get lost and trying to remember the roads to take, the turns to make, so that I can arrive at my destination safely and hopefully on time.

When I turned out from the CTE and saw the giant ERP looming in front of me and it was in operation, it struck me what I had forgotten to do earlier! I did not insert the CashCard into the IU!

At that instant, time froze and everything moves in slow motion like "Bullet Time" in Matrix. All the ambient noise from the moving traffic, blaring of horns seemed to have disappeared and I was wrapped in a cocoon of silence.

I was in the "zone".

Instinctively, I checked my rear view mirror. No car.

I hit the brakes and turned on the hazard lights. My car managed to stop just inches from the gantry. In next quick succession, even though it felt like my motion was slowed down by the thick air, like when you are in the water, I released my seat belt, lift up my butt, took out my wallet from the back of my jeans pocket and slide out the cash card. In one fluid and simultaneous motion, I inserted the card into the IU, while the other hand that was holding the wallet, placed it back into my jeans pocket.

I heard the card clicked into the IU.

Next, I plonked my butt back into the seat, slide the seat belt across my body and clicked it into locking position, turned off the hazard lights and slowly eased my foot onto the accelerator and my car started moving again.

In the same instant, the silence was broken and the noise of the world returned. A bird frozen in its mid flight continued its journey. Time also went back to moving at its normal pace.

"Beep!"

Ah... the wonderful and satisfying sound of ERP when my car passed under the gantry. That was to be the first and last time I enjoyed hearing the beep of ERP. :p

The Voice Of The Void

After I read the papers report on Rear-Admiral (NS) Lui Tuck Yew's disappointment on the "squandered opportunity for a higher degree of self-regulation" (The Straits Times, 5 Feb 2009), I wondered if Mr Lui, who is also Singapore's Senior Minister of State for Information, Communications and the Arts (MICA), had given much thought before he made his comments. (It may do well for Mr Lui to have chosen to use the word framework, instead of regime. I think it was a PR faux pas. Regime... it sounded so millitaristic.) Did he even pause for a while to think why there was a lack of responses to the nasty comments on the attack on MP Seng Han Thong by the Internet community, the netizens? Apparently not.

I also wondered if Mr Lui was a prolific web surfer, if he was, he should have remembered the responses by the online community regarding the MRT suicides, youtube video of 3 tourists bullying an old trishaw uncle and the BrownGate incident. What's the difference in all these incidents as compared to voicing out against the nasty comments on the attack on MP Seng? All the vicitims in the above incidents are people who is like us, the common people. When they get bullied, no one acts or speaks out for them, except us - the voice of the common people. MP Seng, who is a member of an exclusive club, the club of PAP whereby he'll be very well taken care of. The culprit has already been arrested, will be charged and prosecuted. The whole government machinery is already set in motion and actions have been taken. Not only that, we the netizens are now being admonished by a government official for not speaking out against the negative comments?

It seems like Mr Lui had forgotten that we too have limited resources. If the government body MICA (which incidentally is also the ministry Mr Lui serves in) with a lot more resources than an average individual blogger, choose to respond only in their official website Reach or in the mainstream media, all the more, Mr Lui should not expect us to respond to every blog or blog topic.

Quote:

Mica's corporate communications director Julia Hang explained the Government's stance, saying it is "not realistic or efficient to engage Singaporeans on a multitude of online platforms, which would require extensive resources.

- Source

If Mr Lui surfed the web regularly, he would also realise that the nasty comments were rants, by people who had been unhappy with the government. The online community knows better than take notice of the rants. We don't voice our disagreements do not mean we do not deplore the act. We just chose to remain silent because this is not a battle we feel we need to fight. When an ordinary man, committed suicide by jumping onto the MRT tracks due to his inability to make ends meet, remember the outpouring of condolences?

In fact, Mr Lui and his esteem colleagues in the government should pause and consider the crux at hand: Why the flurry of nasty comments and the lack of responses against them? This was not a case of squandered opportunity for a higher degree of self-regulation as Mr Lui has thought. Instead, it was a case of the animosity ofthe people towards the government surfacing and rearing its head. It does well for the government to stop and ponder. If the government do take the time, they would realise that the chasm between the citizens and the government has widened. It has widened so much that the government no longer understand the people and didn't realise the crux of the problem was the disillusioned, disenchanted and disengagement of the people with the(ir?) government. I would dare say the government no longer has the pulse of the nation.

Have the government ever stop to consider why Mr Obama had captured the imaginations of the world, even Singaporeans, when Obama isn't going to be our president? That is because he had connected the people with their hearts, through his uplifting speeches and the promise of change to make the world a better place.

So stop trying to run the country with just the heads and logic. If that is the case, the government will be better off running a country of non-feeling robots. But a true nation is made up of patriotic citizens with a pulsating heart. The ruling party will do well to connect with the people through our hearts.

As Mr P N Balji (Director of the Asia Journalism Fellowship) has highlighted and written, 'Why obsess about Govt response', I would also ask Mr Lui "Why obsess about bloggers response?"

If the government has connected with our hearts and earned our respect, rest assured you would garner our support, the support of the common people and you would hear the resounding voice of the void!

We have heart, we just choose to show it appropriately.

Corporate Junk #15

My staff messaged me after one of her meeting with one of the client. Her message was, "Boss, Company X buying over us? Why you never tell me?"

Surprised, I called her to clarify.

Apparently, the word on the street is that Company X (a big, big company) has offered to buy over my company and the price offered was in the millions! Further word on the street is that I have deliberated the offer for a while and has finally rejected!

My staff further told me that the client said that this information has been circulating in the industry for months already and many other players in the industry have heard it and had been discussing about it.

What the *beep*?!

I told my staff if I'm involved in this deal, I was hearing it the first time! And before I was offered the deal, I had already rejected it? I would reject a deal that is in the millions? Am I crazy or what?

Man, this is news to me!

I assured my staff that there is no such clandestine deal in the making. I rake my brains to think if I had made any conversations with anyone in the industry such that it could have been misconstrued.

The only thing I can remember was many months ago, sometime last year, a client asked me, "Why hasn't Company X offer to buy your company?"

And my reply was an innocent, "How I know?"

How the heck did "How I know" evolve to a deal in the millions?

*FACE PALM!*